Digital PR

Inbound Marketing can play an important role in a more traditional PR strategy including changing public perceptions of an organisation, influencer and journalist outreach and crisis/issues management.

The line between public relations and social media exposure can sometimes become blurred in today’s inbound marketing world.

Since the Panda and Penguin updates of 2011 and 2012 respectively, Google has sought to provide better quality content and web connections, placing preference on sites affiliated with reputable names or quality publications.

Press releases provided the perfect opportunity to profit from that. Since then, press releases have evolved and nowadays don’t really carry the authority or reliability they used to, mainly due to so many businesses using them solely for self-promotion and backlinks. This has made it much harder to get relevant news/announcements approved and published on major news outlets. Press release syndication platforms such as PRWeb are also costly and don’t work for restricted budgets. Continue Reading

The harsh truth about link building is that there are way too many people in the internet marketing industry that think great content is enough. You can publish great stuff (and you should) but that doesn’t mean people will naturally link to you. Generating high quality links means being very systematic with how you create and promote content. The technique presented in this article is definitely one to give a try; it’s called skyscraper because it shares the same logic, people always prefer the best of the best (highest of the high). For those of you who are looking for a solid strategy that will increase search traffic and get your content out there, I highly suggest you keep reading.

“We didn’t act like you’d expect Mozilla to Act. We didn’t move fast enough to engage with people once the controversy started. We’re sorry. We must to better.”

– Mozilla Executive Chairwoman, Mitchell Baker.

On the internet if you want a community then you need to be representative of that community, particularly if your brand or product is all encompassing; meaning that your audience will represent nearly every view, lifestyle or opinion.

You’d think that would be a simple thing to do, especially if you run a search engine. Where is the controversy in that? In that business you consider that EVERYONE is a potential customer unless they completely shun technology (yes, they are those who consciously do this and we must respect that choice). You’re simply making it easier for people to search for information; something we all do every single day. Continue Reading

The biggest challenge for any company working to build content is keeping up the inspiration continue to make content which engages and is shareable.

Starting out with content is often easy. You begin by building stuff which supports your product position and adds value for your audience. But once you’ve managed to master the basics how do you keep your creative juices flowing.

Here are five ways to help fill the well of creative inspiration and keep your content interesting.

Learn from others

Social spends a lot of time sharing. It takes up a portion of our content calendar because the behaviour around social means that to be in the pack you need to share information about what the pack is doing. Take some time each week to review what others are doing, whether they’re from your own industry, from a thought leader or popular social media participant or from a completely random sector. Continue Reading

It’s every marketing manager’s nightmare; something goes wrong and the online community are quick to express how they feel. Periodically I’ll be looking at an example of a trending Australian public relations issue to see how it was handled and what lessons can be learned. I will also give my own personal analysis to see whether it becomes one of the Digital PR winners or losers.

The Brand: Anz Bank Australia

The Topic: goMoney App

The Platform: Twitter

The Situation

ANZ’s goMoney App went down this week and its users where quick to turn to social media to ask ANZ what the deal was and how long it would be before it was back up and running. It was down for two days and the @ANZ_AU was coping the normal criticism that comes when something goes down for the count. Continue Reading

The Age reported recently that the Restaurant and Catering Association has put forward a social media protocol for its members. I have no idea what a ‘protocol’ actually is, however I was interested to read it includes a general acceptance for some diners to take photos of their meals.

It had to happen. The backlash which is guilting people to put down their smartphones, and other electronic devices, and get out into life and smell the roses. People are heeding the call realising their dependency on social platforms for validation and interaction.

There is always a tipping point and in the case of human interaction the pendulum has swung back towards getting more of a balance between online and offline. The key now for marketers and brands is how to create a valued connection within this lifestyle correction. It has to also be one that has longevity and depth of trust. Enter experiential marketing. Continue Reading

It never fails to surprise me when I hear a company say, “We have a separate PR agency as well as our digital agency”. How on earth has the sector been divided like this when PR is the natural fit for digital. Communication suffers when siloed so to deliver it through different agencies compromises its effectiveness from the get go.

PR has long been the poor cousin to advertising and marketing, and it remains the self imposed wallflower in the mix despite the huge opportunities presented by digital. If you were in the industry 20 years ago you would be well aware of the vast changes in corporate communications. The digital revolution has impacted communications massively and the opportunities for all that have come from it are bountiful.

But why is it that so many PR’s – either freelancers or corporates – have failed to fully realise the natural transition of the sector into digital? They say he who hesitates is lost and my industry seems to have taken up residence in the communications abyss. For those who have taken the leap, the rewards within the industry are proving to be very lucrative and successful for client and practitioner alike. Continue Reading

Recently found yourself in a meeting with a bunch of 12-year old hipster types talking in code? Here’s some of the lesser known marketing terms that you may have heard but are not completely sure what they mean.

Abandonment Rate

Also called a drop off rate, this is the measure of people who have not completed a ‘funnel’ or process on a website. This could be because they don’t end up buying an item, don’t go on to register or sign up, or simply aren’t on a page long enough to have actually read the information provided.

A/B testing

Commonly used in web development and other marketing processes, A/B testing involves using two variants of a similar concept to test factors such as hits, interaction, usability, engagement and messaging. You can test everything from the colour of one button, to two completely different versions of landing page. This can help determine which is a more effective and engaging concept. Continue Reading

The world of food has drastically changed thanks to the internet and the way it’s opened up conversations between people around the world. More than ever, people are learning about food on a number of different levels. This has had a massive impact on the effectiveness of how you market a brand in the new economy landscape. So what can food brands learn from others?

Apple

When Apple moved to broaden from just the Mac into a product range of digital devices they focussed their marketing efforts into a brand personality centred around lifestyle, innovation and the aspirations, hopes and dreams of their audience. Their products and their uses were positioned around what people wanted in their lives and how they could make their lives more simple. It was driven on this lifestyle experience, not on what the products actually did. Continue Reading